A Great and Terrible Price
by eirenical
Summary: It is a terrible thing, to know when you are a child the exact date and time and place you are to die. Only one thing is worse - not knowing that the one you love will precede you into death. Judas is dead... and it is all my fault. For that alone, I should be damned for all eternity. (Jesus x Judas, Judas x Mary)
1. Chapter 1

**Title:** A Great and Terrible Price  
**Fandom:** Jesus Christ Superstar (2012 Broadway Revival)  
**Pairing:** Jesus/Judas, Judas/Mary, Jesus + Mary  
**Rating:** NC-17  
**Word Count:** Part 1 - 5774  
**Warnings:** Graphic depictions of sexual situations, slash; if that's not your cup of tea, there's no shame in it... but please don't read it. Thanks! ^_^

**Disclaimer:** _Jesus Christ Superstar_ does not belong to me. It belongs to Sirs Andrew Lloyd Weber and Tim Rice. No harm was meant. I'm just playing. I'll put them back (mostly) intact when I'm done. ^_^

**_April 2, 2013:_** A little over a year ago, I started writing this monster. I moved fast and furious on it, spurred on by repeated visits to see JCS on Broadway. Then the show closed and I just... I didn't have the heart to finish it. Then a friend wrote an amazing JCS story and I got so wrapped up in her headcanon that I couldn't recapture my own... and didn't even want to try. Lately, however, I'd been poking at it, rereading bits here and there and when I turned to said friend to ask her what she'd pick for me to work on of all the WIPs I have going... this story came up. And I thought... "Huh. Why not?" And for the first time in a year, this story _finally cooperated_. O_O I'm not going to question it. I'm just going to be grateful. I am, however, editing as I go, so this will probably go up in three parts. Enjoy?

* * *

**A Great and Terrible Price**  
_by Renee-chan_

It is a terrible thing, to know when you are a child the exact date and time and place you are to die. Only one thing is worse - not knowing that the one you love will precede you into death. It is a fearful thing, to know that you are to die... and even unto that very morning of your death to not understand why. Only one thing is worse - to know that the one you love preceded you into death due to your own actions... or lack thereof.

Judas is dead... and it is all my fault.

For that alone, I should be damned for all eternity.

* * *

Judas came to me hungry, his eyes hollow pits of need. I didn't ask questions then, sensed there was a past there of which he would not wish to speak. His hunger was simple, then, a hunger for food, for water, for safety and simple comforts - a place to rest his head at night, a pair of shoes to protect his feet on the roads, a cloak to keep him warm. His hunger was easy to satisfy then.

As the one craving eased though, others took its place - more complicated, more difficult to satisfy. The second hunger to turn his hollow eyes my way was a hunger for knowledge. Judas wanted to know, to understand... everything. Reading. Writing. Mathematics. Philosophy. Politics. Economics. Science. Religion. History. If I knew it, he wanted to know it. If I didn't know it, he would seek out others among us who did. I didn't know it then, but this vast knowledge he was acquiring... he was acquiring it for me, to make himself useful - nay, indispensable - to me.

It worked.

Long before he was satisfied with what he had learned, I already relied on him more than the others, took advice from him that I couldn't stomach from anyone else, trusted him above and beyond the rest... loved him more dearly, too. The others should have objected, protested, rejected me... us... but Judas, for all his hunger, was an innocent, then. Those few who knew how I felt also knew that nothing would come of it, that Judas would never return my affections... that we were safe.

Would that they had been right!

As Judas' hunger for knowledge was slowly slaked, the third, the last, the most dangerous hunger took hold. And it was a hunger so simple that it was complex. Judas, deprived by that past of which he still would not speak, hungered for simple human contact, for affection... for love. My love. He turned that vast intellect on me and, with every bit of skill he possessed, began to court that love he so desperately sought. I can admit it now - I never stood a chance.

Judas could be possessed of a single-minded intensity which which he drove straight to the heart of a problem to find a solution. And with that intensity, he pierced straight through to my own heart, as well. He saw the secrets in my eyes, ferreted them out one by one by one and used them to his own ends to expose me to him. Nevertheless, I did what I could to dissuade him, showed him the relevant passages in the Torah, reminded him that in our society what he wished was frowned upon, at best, looked on as a sign of Roman corruption at worst. He listened to my every argument, processed the information in his own unique way... and came back to me with arguments to counter every word I had said, demanded to know why I wasted precious time explaining these things to him when to everyone else I simply declared that my service to G-d required absolute purity. Why was that one argument, the one I used on everyone else, not good enough for him?

Why? Because it simply wasn't true... and I knew Judas Iscariot well enough by then to know that he would have ferreted out that untruth, as well, and demanded a different answer. And I would have none to give him. This had been the best one I had and still it had not been good enough. Finally, after weeks of dogged, ever-hounding pursuit, I did the only thing I could... I gave him the truth.

Our movement was still so new, was barely a year old, and we had so very far to go... I could not afford to be seen as one who played favorites among his disciples. Such a thing would rip us apart faster than Rome or the Temple ever could.

Judas considered my answer, went away and thought on it for several hours before returning. And when he returned, his answer was simple - he kissed me. He kissed with the same hunger with which he did everything else, practically devouring my mouth with his own. His hands were everywhere, too - in my hair, on my shoulders, around my waist - as though he couldn't decide where he could best employ them to get from me what he wanted. Finally he settled them, one at my hip, the other wrapped around the back of my neck, both placements that would grant him control over my ability to pull away... and my desire to.

And I did desire to. This could not happen. In such an attachment would be the seeds of my undoing. I knew it. I could feel it... but the warmth of that hand on my hip, the gentle caress of those supple fingers in the fall of my hair... the wet, devouring heat of his lips on mine... I couldn't deny him. I wasn't strong enough.

Judas always seemed to know when he had won an argument and he sensed the moment I ceased to fight - with him and with myself - with equal ease. I could feel the slight cant of his smile pressed against the answering, tremulous tilt of my own. He pulled me away from the others, laid me down amongst a nest of blankets - and it did gall to see that he knew me so well as to not only anticipate my answer but to prepare for it - and satisfied that third hunger... and a hunger in my own being of whose existence even I had been blissfully unaware.

I hungered for that simple human touch, that individual love and affection, as badly and as completely as Judas did. It had been so long since another human being had held me while lacking ulterior motive. And Judas' only ulterior motive had been to give as much pleasure, as much comfort, as he had received. The things he did to me that night... that one, glorious night... they stayed with me, cherished memories to keep me warm even on the coldest of nights thereafter. Only one thought marred the perfection of those moments, one thought that kept me awake, stroking his unruly mass of curls long after Judas had fallen into a deep, blissful slumber.

The next morning, I demanded to know from whom he had learned the things he had shown me the previous night. Judas was young, too young, I had thought at the time, to have this kind of knowledge... this kind of experience. I had ignored the knowledge that he was, in fact, not more than a year or two younger than myself. He always seemed younger than that, and I fear that in my need to punish myself for my own sin, I would have taken any excuse to prevent a repeat occurrence. And so, I pursued this assumed affront to Judas' innocence as a shield, demanded to know to which of my apostles he had gone to learn these things, as he certainly hadn't learned them from me. And the look in his eyes as he quietly answered that none of my followers was to blame for this education - that look of darkest self-loathing before he turned it away - opened a window onto that past of which he still would not speak... and informed me that though I had sought to punish myself with this attack, I had somehow wounded Judas, instead.

He fled me, then, snatched up his clothing, his shoes, and bolted away into the early morning mist. No amount of calling out on my part would bring him back. One day... two days... three, he stayed away. He came back on the third night, his eyes those same dark pits of need they had been when he first arrived in camp... but this time that self-loathing was there, too. He was dirty, his clothing ragged, his hair tangled, the curls matted down with dried mud. He ate with us - quiet, withdrawn, the great wheels of his mind turning in directions that mine could not even comprehend, much less match.

He stayed away from me all through dinner, through our evening prayers and chores. He worked silently, without complaint. It was not until everyone had retired for the night that he came to me. He came in a great rush of billowing cloak, his eyes wild, his hands grasping and desperate. I could no more deny him then than I could the time before. He was different that night, his eyes and hands guiding, asking, but no longer demanding. He guided me to do to him the things he had done to me during our last tryst... the student becoming the teacher, at last. I knew it was wrong, knew I should deny him... but I could not. I felt not even one qualm about it, either... until I saw that which he tried to keep hidden by turning his back to me. As I bent over him, piercing his body as he had so easily done my heart in the beginning, I caught a glimpse of his face - tight, drawn, needing so very badly... and so very sad and frightened at the same time. The single tear that slipped from his eye undid me completely, but I had no idea what I had done to prompt the response and even less idea what to do to fix it.

He fled again the next morning, unable - or unwilling - to break bread with me, with the others. He slunk away before I awoke, stayed away for the rest of the day and for two more days beside before coming back, again.

And with this action, a pattern was set. Judas would be his usual self - my closest companion, my dearest friend, my most trusted advisor and counsel. He would be this to me for days on end, weeks, sometimes. Then one night, he would come to me, seeking the warmth and the comfort that he couldn't ask for any other way. He would then run from me in the days following. Sometimes he would stay in camp and simply not speak to me. Sometimes he would leave camp altogether, would run to scout the outlying areas, to buy supplies at the nearest market, anything to avoid contact with me. Sometimes these absences lasted only a day, sometimes a week. On one, uniquely rare departure he stayed away for a month. And in that one month... everything changed.

* * *

On the surface, there was nothing particularly unique about Mary Magdalene. She was beautiful, but her kind usually were. She was charming, but her kind usually were. She was graceful, elegant, eloquent... as her kind usually were. There was something in her eyes, however, that her kind did not usually have. Those deep brown eyes... something in them showed hope for something better, hope that someday she would no longer live this life.

That hope intrigued me, drew me back to her, again and again. Moreover, as we spoke, as I began to tell her my own dreams of a better world, a world in which mankind loved one another, loved G-d and cared for each other... I began to see those dreams reflected in her eyes. She took my words into her heart and refracted them back to me in a rainbow of dazzling colors. She gave my dreams new life, new purpose.

I think I loved her a little for that, alone.

My apostles did not understand, argued against bringing her with us on our journeys, argued that a woman of her kind did not belong on a holy pilgrimage, that her presence would confuse the weak-hearted. As each of those ideas were given form in words, I watched as my beautiful, graceful, and elegant new friend shrank in on herself, the rainbow in her eyes darkened, turning to self-loathing. It was a look I knew all too well. How often had I seen it in the eyes of my dearest friend, my Judas? Seeing that, I knew for certain that I could not turn her away. It was no longer just a matter of it being the right thing to do to bring her alone. No... I needed her, now, and simply could not leave her behind.

That look in her eyes... if I could understand that look in her eyes... if I could unlock _her_ tattered and abused soul... it might then give me the key's to unlock Judas', as well, to finally get to the heart of what drove him away from me night after night after night.

It was unworthy of me, to think this way, to value her only for my own needs, and I hated myself for it, but even so... I am just a man. In spite of what they had started to say about me, I am only a man. I am mortal. I am fallible. I am weak. I make mistakes. And I did make one that day, a huge, terrible, monumental mistake... and it carried with it consequences I could not have foreseen.

Still, I am a man and I made that mistake. I brought Mary Magdalene into our company, into our pilgrimage, and she changed everything. Those who did not know me assumed I had brought this woman of ill-repute into my camp for the obvious reasons. Those few who knew me knew better knew that could not be the case. They thought that my heart and body belonged solely to G-d. They were half right. My sould belonged to G-d... but my heart and body belonged to another - and when that other returned... between he and Mary, they tilted my world on its side. And to this, the very end of my days, it has not righted itself, yet.

* * *

By the time Judas returned after his month's wanderings, Mary had made herself at home in my camp. She made herself useful where she could, learned ways to make herself moreso every day. She had such a comforting way about her, her touch so soothing that even the most violent of upheavals could be smoothed away with her mere presence. Just as my Judas had done with his intellect, my Mary became indispensable to me as well... for her heart.

Judas came to me immediately upon his return, almost frantic to be back at my side but wild-shy about it, as though unsure of his welcome after so long away. My own heart rejoicied so at his return, however, that was a mystery to me that he could ever think I would turn him away. I clasped him to me, made no secret to him of my joy at his homecoming. He relaxed against me, returned my embrace with equal vigor and, as was his wont, pressed a firm, lingering kiss on my cheek, nuzzled into the fall of my hair. More than anywhere, this embrace, Judas' face pressed so closely to mine... it felt like home.

I made as though to draw him away with me, to speak privately of the things he had seen and done and learned while away, but Mary came between us. It was unintentional, it was not maliciously meant, but she intruded into that private moment as though meant to be there... as she had done these last weeks while Judas was gone. She had no reason to believe that anything had changed and so she made that misstep and Judas... reacted as poorly as I had feared he might. For the first time in my memory, he pulled away from me in the full light of day with no predisposing reason. He pulled away, fled my presence... fled hers. He did not leave camp, though, to my undying gratitude. To lose him again so quickly after his return would have broken something in me, I am sure. He took solace with Peter and James, broke bread with them, shared his news, all the while watching me from across camp with those haunted eyes.

Judas stalked around me for days afterwards, not daring to come closer, not daring to stray too far. I waited, ever patient, for him to come to a decision, knowing that no effort of mine would rush or alter its reaching. Finally, one night after Mary had finished caring for me and gone to her own rest, Judas gave me his answer. He came to my tent, to my bed, like a storm - furious, yet somehow silent, in its intensity. He would not speak, would not hear my words, would not let me be gentle. Our coupling that night was as violent as the storm of which he had reminded me and my heart cried out with it, desperate and saddened that I would surely lose him again so soon.

Come morning, I awoke, expecting to find Judas gone. He was not. He was still in my tent, in fact, curled in a corner, dark eyes bruised and full of that self-loathing I had so longed to understand and to alleviate, if I could. When he saw that I was awake, he slunk to my side like a dog expecting to be beaten. He bowed his head to me, pressed salty-wet kisses to my hands and begged my forgiveness for once again sullying my purity with his tainted touch. It was then that I began to understand, another window into Judas' past sliding open just a touch.

I did the only thing I could do in the face of his anguish. I raised him up, pressed soft kisses on him - his lips, his cheeks, his head, his hands - and told him that there was nothing he needed to be forgiven for, that in my eyes, he was as worthy as any of my disciples, that I did not consider him unclean. At my words, the darkness in his eyes broke, shattered... and I began to see Mary's hope shining far away deep inside them, just a glimmer perhaps, but it was a start. For the first time since he had joined me, I felt that someday Judas might truly come to believe in what we were doing. It brought me such joy that I laughed with it and kissed him, again.

That morning, we coupled in the light of breaking dawn, able to see each other clearly in our passion for the first time... and it was beautiful. Even more beautiful, though, was that Judas did not run from me again after that, staying by my side long into the morning whenever he came to me. And for the first time since I had learned of my destiny, with Judas by my side in the day _and_ in the night... I began to feel a small measure of peace.

* * *

Judas and Mary circled around each other for weeks, months, wary and untrusting. They circled each other and they circled me, constantly pushing and pulling at me as though only one of them could have me in the end. Keeping them apart, keeping their antagonism from ripping apart the entire group, was exhausting. It sapped me of strength I needed for other things and I despaired of ever resolving their conflict.

Simon, James, Peter even, urged me to banish Mary from our company, sensing the strife she caused between myself and Judas and wishing to ease it in whatever way was easiest. Judas, however, was strangely silent on that matter. Only once did he reference the idea of banishing Mary and then only obliquely - asking not why I did not rid us of her, but instead asking why I wasted time on one whose purposes could not match our own.

Weary of the fighting, I snapped back, accused him of envy, of condemning Mary simply for her past. He fell silent at that, eyes downcast. When he finally lifted his face, again, that self-loathing was back in full force in a way it had not been in months. Judas said, "I have no qualms with Mary's former profession, Jesus. It is her effect on _you_ with which I quarrel."

I attempted to dismiss his words, but Judas followed after me, caught at my shoulders and spun me to face him, shook me roughly, fear now in his eyes. He said, "You must listen to me." His tone turned pleading, "Don't you see? You used to listen to me. You used to heed my words. Now, whenever the conversation touches upon Mary, you do not even acknowledge my right to have an opinion. You used to trust me..."

I lifted my hands to cup Judas' face, gently stroked along his cheeks with my thumbs. I said, "I do trust you, Judas. It is your intentions I am no longer certain I trust."

Those words dropped between us like stones - heavy, immoveable, insurmountable. Judas jerked away from me, breathing hard. He tried to speak, failed, tried again... failed again. Finally he said, "My intentions have only ever been to support you, Jesus... you and our movement. This mistrust of yours... Do you not even see? You mistrust my intentions because you feel they have strayed from your own, but it isn't my intentions that have strayed."

I couldn't listen to that. Judas was wrong. He had to be. I was as dedicated to our movement now as I was when we started, perhaps even more so as I sensed my time with it drawing to a close. Still, he did not stop, continued spewing those damning words... those damning truths, "You love Mary so because she focuses purely on you and your comfort, not on the movement. She encourages you to ever greater acts of self-serving behavior, distancing you further and further from the ideals with which you started!"

Judas grew more incensed with every word, as though he had waited long to say these things to me, holding them back because he had known what pain it would cause me to hear them. And it did. It caused me great pain, because underneath my denial... I knew that Judas was not wrong. I had been allowing Mary to give me comfort, to persuade me to rest my burdens for an hour, an evening, a night... a day. I had allowed her to purchase things to ease her task, spending money which - as Judas would surely point out - could have been better distributed elsewhere. I did these things because I was tired, I was afraid and I was in need of comfort, yet I felt I needed to stand strong before my apostles - unwavering. I had felt that I needed to appear more than human... a ruse started for my nearest and dearest which eventually extended to the general populace and backfired on me spectacularly.

When it had been Judas alone giving me solace he never failed to make distinction between his role as my lover and his role as my advisor. He took great pains, in fact, never to blur the line between the two, not wanting to let our mutual pleasure become a way for him to gain undue influence over me. A woman, though... a woman is a woman at all times. She can no more turn off her grace or her compassion than she can stop breathing. It is simply part of who she is. And Mary, through no purposeful intent, had utilized every bit of that grace and compassion in her dealings with me. She knew no other way. It had influenced me to be her protector - unreasoning and unquestioning - from all comers... including my own beloved Judas. I had protected her and allowed her to coddle me, to shower me with gifts and rewards I had not yet earned, yet somehow thought my due. Was that not pride? Gluttony? Greed?

I was caught, then, without an answer. I was embarrassed, ashamed that with Judas estranged from me, even this little bit, my intellect had fled, as well. It angered me, that I depended so on another for my ability to see clearly, even as I knew that that very anger was misplaced, unwarranted. It made me angrier, still, and in my pride and my anger... I lashed out at the only target in range.

"Is it so wrong, Judas?" I spat out, "Is it so wrong that I should have an occasional comfort for myself? You are right. Mary cares for me. She is here for me. I once thought you felt the same. Perhaps, I was wrong."

Judas took a step back from me, as though I had slapped him. His eyes widened with pain, his breath caught. I could see the wheels of his great mind turning, spinning uselessly on themselves as they tried to come to his aid... and failed, tripped up unmercifully by his emotions. Judas took another step back from me, then another. Finally he took one last step back, turned and fled. I stood there and stared after him, beyond horrified by the words that had come from my mouth, words I had shaped, deliberately crafted to wound. I realized then that as often as I had brutally rejected his well-intentioned advice, as often as I had driven Judas away from me, it was no less than a miracle that he continued to return to my side. I would not always be so blessed. One day I would drive him away... and he would not return. I couldn't let that day be today.

Before I could give chase, however, a delicate hand alighted on my arm and arrested my movement. Mary. Of course she had witnessed everything. After months of being so careful not to show preferential treatment to one or the other of them, that she should have witnessed that calculated cruelty on my part was insult added to the injury I had already done Judas. It was unforgivable. I opened my mouth to speak, to try to explain this all away, but Mary raised her other hand and covered my lips, shook her head. Her beautiful, dark eyes were so sad as she said, "No. Don't explain. Even you could not have words good enough to explain what I just saw."

Mary looked off into the distance and when she looked back... there was disappointment in her eyes. She said, "Jesus... you are wise, that is true, but it is an otherworldly wisdom. You are not wise in the ways of this world as I am - as Judas is. It makes you precious to us both, to all of those who follow you, but it means that you often do not see the world for what it is. Judas, of us all, tries the most to protect you from the world's cruel reality. So, it is doubly cruel that when he is unsuccessful and you are hurt, that you turn and lash out at the very hand which tried to protect you. Perhaps you should take this opportunity to think on why that is." She straightened, eyes determined, "I will go after Judas. For now, you have forfeited that right." She then gathered her skirts and took off running, leaving me to ponder both how I could have made such a terrible blunder... and how Mary had come to care so for Judas that she would step between us to defend him.

* * *

Of course, I followed after Mary. I was the one who had made this error and I believed I should have been the one to fix it. In addition, I did not entirely trust Mary's sudden compassion for Judas and feared that in his unbalanced state she might somehow do him harm, even if unintentionally. And so, I followed. They had not gone far.

Judas was sitting on a rock at the outskirts of our camp, one of the few shaded spots in the area. Mary was beside him, sitting close enough to touch but not doing so. I crept closer until I could distinguish the words in the quiet murmur of their voices. Mary was the one speaking as I approached.

"...didn't mean the things he said. You surprised him, Judas, and embarrassed him. He has been overwhelmed and distraught of late. He did not know how to respond to your accusations, though he heard the truth in them. You can not blame him."

"I don't," Judas' answer was quick, clipped, venomous. He turned towards Mary and spat out, "I blame you. You have turned him from his purpose, made him forget why he is doing these things he does, planted thoughts in his head which have no business there."

Mary sighed, shook her head, ever the epitome of grace even when under attack. She laid a gentle hand on Judas' arm and said, "`There is certainly some truth in your words. I can't deny it. I have seen the pain he is in, the despair which takes deeper and deeper root in him with each passing day, and I cannot help wanting to ease his burden. You feel the same - I see that you do - yet you resist the instinct to comfort. Why?"

Judas jerked away from Mary, off the rock and back several paces before spitting out, "Because I am not a whore." Though Mary flinched from those words, she stayed silent as Judas continued, "He does not need me for comfort. I am here to provide him strategy, to help him spread the message, to advise him... not..." He cut off his words, wrapped his arms around himself.

Both were silent for a moment, eyes not quite meeting, bodies canted away from each other, arms crossed over breasts. Finally, Judas repeated, eyes bleak, "I am not a whore."

As I stood there stunned, Mary rose from her seated position, crossed to take Judas in her arms... and he allowed it, even buried his face in the crook of her neck, an occasional sob shaking his shoulders as he let go of the burdens he was carrying, allowed Mary to take up some of their weight. Mary stroked his hair, his back, placed gentle kisses on his brow, finally said, almost too quietly for me to hear...

"Not to him, Judas. Never to him."

At those words, Judas shuddered, unwrapped his arms from around himself and wrapped them around Mary, clutching her tightly to him. His tears came fast and freely after that. Watching they two together, wrapped in each other's misery like a shroud, I thought I might be starting to understand. I had been right to liken the look in Mary's eyes to the one in Judas', more right than I had known. So many things about Judas finally began to make sense to me in that moment: why he had been so starved for affection, for knowledge, why he had been almost feral when he first joined us, why he seemed to know the words of the prayers and the teachings so well and yet had not the first idea of what they meant... why Mary frightened and angered him so.

Listening to my beloved forced to sob out his anguish on another's shoulder all but broke me. I did not want to listen to it for another moment, but I forced myself to do so as a penance. _I_ had done this. No amount of self-righteousness, no amount of physical comfort was worth having done this to someone I loved. As Judas calmed, Mary pushed him upright, wiped the tears from his eyes. He took in a great, shuddering breath, said shakily, "After all I've spoken against you, I do not deserve this kindness from you."

Mary smiled then, and the light in that smile was as dazzling as in the first she'd given me. I could see that even Judas' heart was not unmoved. She said, "You spoke out because you feel the one you love is in danger. I can't agree with your conclusion but Judas... I would be hard-pressed, indeed, to find fault with your reasons for acting out." She raised a hand to his cheek and said, "Judas... he is a good man. He has worked so hard these last few years... is it so wrong for him to take some time for himself?"

Judas turned away, then, and I could no longer see his face. He said, "I fear it, Mary. I fear that he has allowed the people to place him upon a pedestal and that if he begins to seem fallible, now, they will rip him to shreds. The people love nothing more than to see an idol fall. He is ill-prepared to handle such a fall and the more you cozen him, the more likely it is that he will tumble from that exalted position he never should have had... and shatter when he does."

"I understand your fears, Judas, but I do not share them. Jesus knows what he is doing, what he can handle. Trust in that, as we all do," she said, exhibiting more faith in me than I had even in myself.

Judas sighed, simply said, "I can't, Mary. I just can't."

Mary sighed, "Try, Judas. You will see I am right in the end." She stepped back and added, "Perhaps a gesture of good faith between us?" At Judas' curious look, she smiled and said, "I will tell you this: He was as traumatized by what he said to you as you were. Go to him tonight. Make peace between you, Judas. Give him what comfort you can and trust that G-d chose him and that _he_ chose you... and that means you are worthy of asking for the more that you want from him."

As she turned to walk away, I fled, heart beating as quickly as a rabbit's as I tried to avoid getting caught. As always, I would wait for Judas to come to me on his own terms. I owed him that much and more.


	2. Chapter 2

**April 9, 2013: **So, real life has gone and gotten in the way of my editing this monster. Sorry about that. It was unanticipated and unavoidable. :-P I'd like to say that I'll hopefully have the last chapter ready to go within the next day or so, but I highly suspect that's the one which will need the most work... so I make no promises. -.-;;; Thanks for sticking with me!

* * *

I waited half the night for Judas, nervously pacing my tent like a man preparing for the gallows. With each passing moment, my heart grew a fraction colder, more fearful. What if my thoughts earlier had been a foreshadowing? It would not be the first time such foreknowledge had come to me, unbidden and unwelcome. What if this was the wedge that finally drove Judas away from me for good? I paced and paced and paced some more, unable to be still and unwilling to leave my tent and miss the moment when Judas would come.

Several of the great constellations had already risen and wheeled past overhead before I finally concluded that, in spite of Mary's unexpected encouragement, Judas would not come to me that night. I paced back and forth again and again and again, more disappointed than I could readily admit that Judas and I would not have the chance to clear the air between us before dawn. I sat on my bedroll, legs drawn in underneath me, staring at the flap of my tent as though willing Judas' form to appear. It did not. What did, though, was a sound - a great sound. The sound of the shofar.

That got me to my feet as nothing else would and I emerged from my tent, anxiously scanning the night for the source of the noise. When I reached the guard station, James the Lesser was just putting away the instrument whose sound had driven me from my musings and into the night. He shrugged apologetically for disturbing me and said, simply, "Simon's report of an all-clear. We are free to enter Jerusalem whenever you are ready, Jesus. We but await your command." I thanked James for the report though the information did nothing to soothe my anxiety. We were not ready to take on all of Jerusalem, our holy capitol - and I had said this to no one but Judas... but I was unsure we ever would be. Many of my apostles were weak at heart, still resorted to violence in situations that would be better served by peaceful protest. We were not ready, but with time beating down on me like the great heat of the desert sun at summer's high noon, I feared I would have little choice in the matter, that we would take on Jerusalem, prepared or not.

Disturbed by far more than my argument with Judas, now, I found I could not return to my tent. I was too distracted, too full of anxiety, doubt... fear. I needed Judas. I went to the tent he shared with Peter and Simon, grateful that I would not have to get past Simon - a notoriously light sleeper - that night, and knelt by Judas' bedroll to feel for his sleeping form. My hands encountered nothing but empty air. Where could he be? If he was not here, not asleep... where was Judas?

With my heart full of dread, I raced from the tent, ready to sound a general alarm. I checked myself within a few paces, however. Judas was well-known for his occasional disappearances, so his absence from camp at night would not normally be cause for alarm... and Judas would not thank me for calling attention to him in this way. I moved listlessly around camp, eyeing the watchfires and those camped around them, pulling back tentflaps to peer inside. There was no sign of Judas. I turned back towards my own tent, then, nearly ready to give up for the night when I realized that there was one person I might safely enlist in my search, someone who would know that Judas' disappearance was of concern without having to be told why - Mary.

I turned my steps towards Mary's tent, slowing my advance considerably as I did so. I was still uneasy with what I had witnessed earlier in the day, unsure what it meant. Clearly there was a connection between my two closest friends that I did not understand - that I was certain, in fact, that I _could_ not understand - and it had sprung into being, whole and intact, right under my very nose without me even being aware of its germination. In truth, I was not ready to confront Mary about it, especially after having been rebuked so soundly earlier. Still... I could not leave this situation unresolved and Mary was my only remaining option for assistance.

I made my way to Mary's tent, pausing just at the entrance. There was a soft glow which lit the tent from the inside and I was relieved that I would not be disturbing Mary's slumber... but I could not help but wonder why she was still awake. Fear that she had returned to her wanton ways kept me from pushing open the tent flap to see for myself. If she truly had turned back to her former profession while with my company, I found myself not wanting to know - especially not when my determined objections that she could ever do so were what had prompted my falling out with Judas to begin with. That would be too cruel.

So, I stood outside the tent, crouched and listening, while trying to pretend I was doing anything but exactly that. Not a minute later, my ears were rewarded in a way I desperately wished they had not been. A low groan issued forth from inside Mary's tent - and unless she was tending to a wounded man inside, there were not many other options for what could have made that sound other than exactly what I had feared it would be. Worse still, though... the second time that groan sounded, I realized that I knew the voice that had uttered it - knew it well - as I had heard it make such an utterance before.

With that knowledge beating hard beneath my breast, I could no longer stay hidden and hiding. I crept forward, pushed at the tent flap until a corner came loose and I could peer inside. And what I saw... dear G-d, I wished I could unsee it the moment the vision registered to my eyes. Judas was sprawled supine on the floor of Mary's tent, one hand thrown upwards, a knuckle caught between his teeth to muffle the noises that had already betrayed him, the other buried in Mary's hair.

I cursed myself as I realized that even now, even in light of such a betrayal by the two I loved most, even as I despaired that Mary had fallen so easily back into her old ways... even so, I could not stop myself from noticing how very beautiful Judas was in the glow of the lamp light. His skin shone with sweat, the muscles of his abdomen bunched tight, his head thrown back to expose the long line of his throat... Judas was the most beautiful man I had ever laid eyes on and in the midst of pleasure he was more beautiful still.

His body jerked and trembled as I watched, fitful under Mary's skilled hands... and mouth? I watched as she moved, as she trailed kisses across Judas' stomach, down his legs and back up his inner thighs. I couldn't imagine what she could be about, but I found myself completely entranced and unable to look away. From the sounds my beloved was making under this tender onslaught, the way his muscles bunched and shook, what Mary was doing was far from unpleasurable. She placed one last kiss at the juncture of Judas' hip and thigh before moving back upwards to place a gentle kiss on his forehead and whisper something in his ear. Whatever she said, his breath caught and he nodded. She smiled softly, kissed his forehead again, and moved back downwards.

I leaned forward, trying to get a better view of the proceedings, though had I been asked I would have denied such motivation to my last breath. Mary settled back between Judas' legs and pushed them out to the sides to give herself easier access. She then braced her hands on his hips, leaned down... and engulfed him with her mouth. I thanked G-d that Judas' own hand chose that moment to fail in its efforts to keep him silent, for I let out a cry of my own that I most certainly did not want heard by those inside.

Judas' second hand found its way back into Mary's hair, even as the first returned to its now clearly futile task of trying to cover the soft cries of pleasure tumbling forth from his lips. The sight of him spread out, flushed and wanting, of Mary, gently but firmly holding down his hips as he instinctively fought to thrust up into her mouth, her long hair forming a drape around them to hide them from all prying eyes but my most determined ones - he was beautiful... and so was she. _They_ were beautiful. Watching them, I found my mouth going dry, my breath catching in my throat... and my manhood growing hard despite my efforts to prevent it.

I stayed there, crouched outside Mary's tent, watching until she had brought Judas to completion with a practiced air. He lay there for a moment, still and breathing hard, before stirring himself to sit up. He watched Mary out of bruised, haunted eyes, and I finally understood that though he had taken physical satisfaction from the act for certain, emotionally it had done nothing positive for him. Seeing my beloved in that light, my heart clenched in my chest. I hoped that it was different when he was with me, desperately hoped it was so... needed it to be so. I knew Judas well enough to know that he would tell me the truth of the matter if I asked it of him, but if the answer was as I feared - that he continued to lie with me out of duty, out of affection, but not out of love or his own desire - I found myself a coward and not wishing to know.

I turned my attention back to Mary and Judas. Judas had a smile on his face that did not entirely reach his eyes as he held out a hand for Mary and laid her gently down on the floor of the tent in the reverse of their earlier positions. She shook her head, made as if to sit back up, but Judas just smiled and leaned over to kiss her, one hand stroking her breast through the thin fabric of her dress, the other drifting downwards, sliding underneath. When he found what he sought beneath her voluminous skirts, Mary let out a breathless scream and threw her head backwards, her back arching off the floor. Judas smirked and moved his hand, again, watching for her each and every reaction.

Seeing that she had given in to that desire, Judas' smile widened and he shifted to move Mary's dress out of his way. Once she was revealed to him, he bent over her, returned the favor of those initial teasing kisses, then with no further preamble, buried his face between her legs. Just as before, I hadn't the first idea what he was doing, but from the scream of pleasure Mary let out, I could guess all too easily, and judging by the noises that Mary continued to make thereafter, Judas was as skilled in his own way as she was in hers. I felt a pang in my heart at that obvious display of skill, at the idea that I, too, had taken advantage of it for my own purposes, my own pleasure, without thinking more than fleetingly of what he must have done to acquire it.

Much to my shame, I stayed, watched until the echoes of Mary's last culminating scream of pleasure had died away into the night. Once she had her breath back, she sat up, reached for Judas... and one thing this night finally went as I expected it would. He shied away from her, eyes still haunted and full of self-loathing. Mary sighed, pulled him to her, anyway, and brought him to rest against her chest, carding her fingers through his soft curls and murmuring soothing words into his ears. Eventually, he blew out the lamp and lay down beside her, head resting on her breast, and she reached for a blanket to drape over them both.

It did not take long for her to fall asleep. We had all had a long day and Mary's had been longer than most. I caught my breath as I watched them, envious, but still hoping to see Judas allow himself to rest, just this once. My prayers, however, went unanswered. Once certain that Mary had drifted into a deeply satisfied slumber, Judas gathered his clothing, dressed as quietly as he could and moved towards the tent flap. I scrambled out of his way into the cover of the surrounding darkness not a moment too soon.

Judas exited the tent clutching his outer robe to him and looking so lost... so young. He took a step towards his own tent, stopped. He then took a step towards mine and stopped, again. I fought the desire to push him in the direction I wished. After nearly ten minutes of hesitation, Judas finally completed his second action and stepped off in the direction of my tent. I rose and followed.

Judas stopped outside my tent, hesitating before he pushed open the flap, but push it open he did. He peered inside, squinted, finally took a hesitant step forwards, ducking his lean frame to look more closely. I heard him call my name, softly, quietly. He took another step inside. I eased closer, listened as he shuffled around inside the tent, trying to locate my sleeping form. Of course, he found nothing. Before he could make a move to leave the tent, however, I came to a decision.

I needed Judas. I'd known that since he joined me nearly three years ago. I needed him for his insight, for his intellect... for his caring and compassion, for the way he took care of me without ever seeming to, for the way he never forgot how important our work was even when I grew weary and wanted to set down the entire load for someone else to shoulder... for the way he loved me. He kept me human, kept me grounded, but never let me forget that I served a higher purpose. In short, I needed him because he was my better half... and I loved him. I needed him to know that he was as important to me, as well-loved, as Mary... perhaps more so. I needed him to know that I did not keep him at my side merely for my own pleasure. And I thought maybe Mary had just given me what I needed to show him that, if I had the courage.

I crept forward, staying low as I passed through the tent flap. It felt... it felt right. I had abused Judas' loyalty, love and friendship terribly that day. I had no right to loom over him as someone to be respected. Not tonight. Tonight I was the supplicant in need of forgiveness. Judas had only been trying to protect us, to protect me. I owed him better than what I had given him.

Judas was turned away, peering into the darkness, afraid to move too quickly for fear of stepping on me or kicking me where he thought I lay sleeping. I moved quietly, quickly, to kneel by his side. Once positioned well, I reached up, touched his hip with my right hand. He jumped, let out a small scream, quickly muffled. His breathing sped up and he stuttered out, "M-my Lord?"

I shook my head, only realizing that he couldn't see me in the dark as well as I could him when he asked after me, again. I reached my other hand up, gently gripped Judas' hips in my hands. He swallowed hard, breath quickening further still - from fear or anticipation, I didn't know... though I suspected the former. I had not yet even confirmed for him who was in the tent with him and he had no way of knowing my intent. To my shame, however, I found I could not speak. The sheer audacity of what I was about to do, my fear that he might reject me for it, that I might see that hated self-loathing in his eyes again when he looked on me... that I might lose him... these things kept me silent. Instead, I gripped his hips a little harder, pulled him close to me and rested my forehead against his lower abdomen, fingers gently kneading at his hips and lower back.

Judas gasped, half-buckled over me as my breath ghosted lower still than his abdomen. As he did so, his hands fell to my shoulders, my hair, and he asked again, more certain this time, "My Lord?"

I shook my head, finally managed to answer, "Not tonight, my friend... I have no right to claim that title tonight." Judas made as if to drop to his knees beside me, but I held him upright in his place. He made a noise of confusion, but I shushed him by pushing up the material of his tunic and placing a gentle kiss just above the waistband of his pants at his hip. I then mouthed my way lower over his pants to place gentle kisses along the crease between his hip and thigh. He gasped and again folded over me, hands clutching at my shoulders. Again, I steadied him.

Hands clutching fitfully in my tunic, Judas said, "My L- _Jesus_. What are you doing?"

I looked up then, a fortunate beam of moonlight coming through the tent flap illuminating the darkness just enough for us to see each other clearly in that moment. My own look of slowly dawning mischievous enjoyment met a look on Judas' face of horrified disapproval. My own smile faltered. That had not been the reaction I sought, nor had I thought Judas would guess what I was about so quickly. I said, "Judas...?"

He closed his eyes, swallowed hard, his hands convulsing in the course material of my tunic. When Judas' eyes opened once more, he took a deep breath and looked Heavenward as though praying for patience. I had been privileged to see that look on his face but once before, when we had gone through a town and been surrounded by a group of local children who would not leave me be. I had never thought to see it directed at my own self. He finally gripped my shoulders more firmly and pushed me back from where I still rested against his lower body. Slowly, as though to one of those children, he explained, "_My Lord_, this is not appropriate."

"Why not?" was my reply. The words came out petulant, like a child's, and though I did not like hearing that tone in my own voice, I could feel Judas gathering to pull away from me, then, and knew I could not allow it to happen, that if he pulled away now, I would lose him. I did the only thing I could think of to do. I grabbed his hips and pulled him back in, pressed my face back against his lower abdomen... and then dropped lower to kiss him through the cloth of his pants. I could feel it as he responded, half-hardened in spite of his disapproval and I smiled, mouthed him a little more firmly, with a little more surety.

Gasping above me, Judas returned to clutching convulsively at my shoulders, letting out a strained whimper as he again attempted to straighten and pull away. I would not have it this time. Finally, he let out a plaintive cry and said, "My Lord, you do not understand! Please..."

Only the true pain in his voice kept me from ignoring Judas' continued protests. I looked up, answered the fear in his eyes with another gentle kiss for the bared skin at his hip. I said, "Judas... tonight I am not your Lord. I am not a prophet. I am not a rabbi. I am not the Messiah. I am not anyone but Jesus, son of Joseph and Mary... and your lover. Tonight, and every other night hence, we are equals..." When Judas opened his mouth to protest, I raised my voice to cover his words, "...as I always considered us to be."

Judas fell silent, mouth still opened slightly in shock. I slid my arms around his hips in a gentle embrace and nuzzled against his lower abdomen. One of his hands raised from my shoulder to stroke through my hair - softly, slowly, full of wonder. It was the first time he had done such a thing. Always it had been me running my hands through his hair, as though petting some beautiful, exotic animal. Apart from that very first night, always it had been me in a position of power over him, though I had not intended it to be so. To be his lord and teacher in the daytime and his lord and master at night... that had not been my intent. No wonder that self-loathing. I was only lucky he had never thought to direct it outward towards me where it belonged or I would have lost him long before now.

Judas' hand stilled in my hair, then, and he said softly, "Jesus... this changes nothing. What you tried to do... it is unseemly, inappropriate, for you to... it just... it isn't done."

I frowned, confused. How could he say such a thing when he had just come from doing such things, himself? Why were they acceptable for him and for Mary, but not for me? Again, I found myself in a position of ignorance of something which Judas understood as clearly as he breathed. I did not like it any better then than I had earlier that day, but this time I was determined not to take my embarrassment out on the one trying to help me understand. Mary had been right. I was not wise in the ways of the world as they were. I needed whatever guidance Judas would give me. I loosened my hold on him, leaned back into a crouch to better look up into the dark brown of Judas' eyes and simply asked, "Why?"

Judas' eyes widened momentarily, then narrowed in anger and he flung himself away from me to angrily pace the small confines of my tent. Several passes later, he dropped hard to his knees across from me and reached out to grip my hands in his, squeezing them almost painfully. He spat out the following explanation, "Because that, it... It is a way to give pleasure without asking any in return." Seeing I still did not understand, he clutched one of my hands to his chest, bowed over it and said bitterly, "Jesus, it is a whore's trick, nothing more... it is not worthy of you to engage in such activities."

My eyes had adjusted enough to the dark by then to see the wild look in Judas' eyes, even though his head was bowed to hide it from me. I had touched a nerve here that I'd been unaware was lurking beneath the surface. Though it may seem brash, I will admit that I did pray for guidance to help me through this unexpected crisis between us. More unexpectedly, still... those prayers were answered. I lifted my free hand to cup Judas' face and said simply, "Whore's trick or no, Judas, that is what I want... a way to worship you as you do me, a way to show you that I love you without requiring anything of you in return. And if that makes me like unto those of Mary's kind... then so be it. There are far worse things to be."

Judas rose to his feet then, back turned to me so that I could no longer see his face. Moments later, I could see his shoulders shaking, heard as he fought with himself to prevent tears. He wanted to reprimand me, to remind me that the actions I took had consequences. He wanted to remind me that this very attitude is what he had rebuked me for earlier that day, that allowing me to do this thing would also be allowing me to make a hypocrite of him... but I could also see how desperately he craved what I was offering. For once, finally, I had read what he needed correctly. And I knew by the way he reached back for me, despite his obvious misgivings, that I had won my argument. I reached out, pulled Judas' hips back around towards me as I pressed my cheek against his outstretched hand. That hand spasmed momentarily against my face before gently cupping it, stroking along my jaw. He whispered, "So be it," and then slid that hand back into my hair, gently running his fingers through it.

I smiled, leaned in and slid my hands under Judas' shirt, ran them up his sides to settle into the hollows just beneath his ribcage that always seemed made to fit my hands. I used my grip to pull him towards me, leaned in to kiss his lower abdomen, his stomach, the bottom of his ribcage. He jerked with each kiss, shivered under my hands as I trailed those kisses higher slowly rising to my feet, lifting my hands from those tempting hollows and dragging his tunic with me as I moved. When my hands reached his chest, he shrugged out of his outer robe and obligingly lifted his arms to allow me to lift the shirt up over his head and drop it to the side. He shivered once but kept his eyes locked with mine as I slowly lowered myself back to my knees before him. He was unsure, still, nervous at our reversal of position, but I was determined to see this through... for both our sakes.

I lifted my hands back to the hollows of Judas' sides, a familiar place, a comforting one, and pulled him close to me, again. This time, however, I slid my hands downwards, caught at the waistband of his pants and slid my hands back, over the curve of his buttocks and down the backs of his thighs, dragged his pants down with them, revealing inch after slow inch of perfect golden skin. Dear G-d, Judas was even more beautiful here, with me, than he had been with Mary. I allowed myself to entertain the thought that that might be unfair bias talking... then quashed it ruthlessly. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, after all, so who was to say I was wrong?

Once Judas was bared to me, I leaned in, able to kiss directly all those places I had only touched through cloth earlier. And in my mind's eye, I could not help but remember each spot at which Mary had placed her lips, found myself ghosting across each of them as though questing for what little of her own taste and essence she had left behind. Judas trembled under my touch, one hand buried in my hair so, _so_ carefully, so as not to tug, the other back in his mouth being gnawed upon to prevent the issuance of any unseemly sounds. Good. I liked him this way, flushed, wanton and a hair's span from losing control.

Only... now that I had him exactly as I wanted him, I was not entirely sure what to do. Mary had made it look so natural, so easy. Staring at him now, though, I was not even sure where to begin. Judas shifted above me, sensing my uncertainty and ready to pull away again at the least excuse. No. I would not have it. I leaned forward, pressed a kiss at the juncture between Judas' thigh and his groin, allowed myself to flick my tongue lightly against the crease. Judas gasped, almost buckled over me, again. It occurred to me then that this position would not be tenable for long. I could not support both our weights and accomplish what I wished at the same time. I was not that skilled.

Judas' hand in my hair gave my head a gentle scratch and when I looked up, he hesitantly smiled, "May I offer advice without reprimand?"

I pressed another kiss to his stomach and nodded, "Of course."

He cleared his throat, "This would be far easier for us both if I were to join you on the floor."

That was the same conclusion I had drawn myself, but I was not entirely satisfied with it, could not shake the idea that were I to place myself in such a way as to be looming over him again, it would belie my declaration that we were to be equals from here on. In the end we compromised - Judas joined me on the floor, but braced his back against the center pole of the tent. Though he still thought the idea a strange one, for my sake, he was willing to do as I asked. I crawled between his legs and leaned forward to lightly kiss his lips. Judas lifted his hands to my face, pulled me closer, still, and sealed our lips together once more. The heat of his mouth on mine, the soft, wet thrust of his tongue against my own... Judas still kissed as though he would devour me. All these years later, he had still not lost any of his hunger for what I represented, for the knowledge he could gain from me... but most of all, he had not lost his hunger for _me_. Only one thing had changed - my hunger now matched his own.

I pulled myself reluctantly from Judas' lips, traced a trail of kisses back down his chest, his abdomen, finally settled myself along the floor between his legs. When I looked up to see him watching me, dark eyes intently focused on my own, it nearly proved my undoing. I could not continue to look, jerked my gaze away, focused it downwards. With a deep breath, I took him in my hand, smiled as he gasped above me, fought not to bury his hand in my hair and tug. The muscles of his thighs bunched with the effort not to clamp around me. Still, I was far from finished. I bent my head, parted my lips... and finally took him into my mouth. The strangled whine he let out from above me was all the accolade I needed to encourage me.

I took more of him, as much as I could, and he cried out louder, jerked under my hands. There was a small part of me, detached from the proceedings, that could not help but notice odd details - the smell of him, somehow more primal here than at any other point on his body, the rough rasp of the rug beneath my knees as I moved, the constant tremble in his legs as he fought to hold still for me. However, at one particularly appreciated action on my part he could not help himself. Steeped in the rhythm of what I was doing, I reacted without thinking, slung an arm across his hips to hold him down, then smiled when he nearly sobbed in relief above me at that assistance. No longer distracted by unplanned movements on his part, I was free to concentrate on other things and what my mind returned to, over and over, was that I could hardly believe that where my lips were now... Mary's had been a mere hour before, maybe less. Far from being off-putting, however, I found the thought strangely exciting, as though this act had cemented the connections between the three of us in ways I could not understand and perhaps never would.

It did not take long before Judas let out a strangled cry, breath heavy as he tried to push me away. I knew why he did so, but I would not allow it. I wanted this. All of it. When he spilled his seed I drank it down, mouth moving gently over him as he collapsed over me, unable to hold himself upright a moment longer. I released him from my mouth but curled closer to him, arms wrapping around his waist as he shook and trembled over me, draped across my back like a living blanket. When he calmed, I eased him down beside me, took him into my arms and kissed his forehead as I cradled him close.

Judas lay quiescent in my embrace for an endless round of heartbeats, seemingly unwilling to contemplate movement or action of any kind. I will admit to having felt a surge of pride when I realized that I had been the one to bring him to that state. There was no pain in his eyes, no hint of that self-directed hatred I had so feared would be there. There was nothing but bliss... and wonder. After a time, he made a soft, questioning sound and shifted, twitched his hand down my flank as though to reach for me and reciprocate my gift to him, but I caught his hand in my own, lightly kissed the palm and then returned it to its spot between us, resting against my heart. I had meant what I said. This was not about reciprocation. This was about Judas and showing him how very much he was loved and appreciated. From the enthralled, enraptured expression still resting on his face - so very different from the one he had worn when finished with Mary - I had succeeded in demonstrating my point. He made one last sleepy noise of protest, but I quickly shushed him. Grabbing his outer robe from the floor, I draped it over us both, then pulled Judas up against me and held him there, against my heart, for the remainder of the night.

I did not know it then, but that was to the be last true night of peace we two were ever to know in this life. The next day we arrived in Jerusalem... and everything changed.


	3. Chapter 3

_**April 23, 2013:**_ To those of you who have been waiting for this chapter, I apologize. RL kind of exploded at me and I ended up with no time to finish editing this and post it. Hopefully you'll find it worth the long wait. -.-;;;

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**_Chapter 3_**

Peter, Simon - most of the apostles - were beside themselves with joy when we finally arrived in Jerusalem. Even I could not help but be swept up in the celebration. There were throngs of people surrounding us, insisting on laying down palm branches over which we were to walk. As an outpouring of support and love, I had never seen its like, nor would I ever, again. I will admit to having been moved by the showing, even as my heart ached with foreknowledge of what was to befall me in this city, beyond this welcome.

As Simon did, these people expected me to bring about change, to bring them closer to G-d and thus ensure them success and avarice. They wished for a messiah to come and raise them from the depths of their despair and cast out the Romans who so oppressed them - but I was not Moses. I had no power to do such a thing. I knew it. Judas knew it. We had all known it once. I was merely a rabbi, a teacher, a man leading by example of what we must all do together to improve our lot. That was the only power I had... to inspire others to acts of kindness and love equal to those I practiced, myself. I had no military might, no great strength. That was Simon's domain. I had no cunning, no great ability for stealth. That was Peter's. I had no great intelligence, no head for strategy, for putting together the pieces into a whole with which we could work. That was Judas' domain.

No. My great secret was this: my strength, my power, my might... came to me from G-d in the form of my followers. I had no great skills of my own other than compassion for my fellow human beings, an eloquence of speech and this dreaded foreknowledge of events to come. And in my compassion, I was like only unto one other in our company - Mary. She, too, had a great compassion of spirit, an unflagging love for myself and for those I preached to that knew no end. I admired her for it and I loved her for it, for she was the only one among my apostles who understood me in that way. Judas tried, but there was some fundamental gap between himself and his fellow men that he needed me to bridge for him. He cared for me. He loved me. He had endless amounts of patience and compassion... for _me_. And through me, he could channel it to others - no other way.

Still, I knew the strengths and weaknesses of my companions by rote. Together, they twelve and I, we had all the strength and skill we needed for any endeavor we undertook. But even my Twelve wished things of me that I did not wish to give, that were not in my power to give. Simon expected me to roust the Romans from their places of power and send them packing. Peter wanted me to take the place of the high priests in the temple, wanted to worship me as he had once worshipped them. That idolatry, that worship, that faith in my abilities that I did not share... it made me distinctly uncomfortable.

Only Judas seemed to see clearly what it was that I was - and was not - capable of. He worried over it like a dog with a bone, fretting himself to pieces over the fact that we drew so much attention these days, constantly nagging at me that we should return to our humbler roots, stop shaking the trees where we could be seen. I wished with all my heart that I could listen to him, could tell him that I understood his fears, and more, that I agreed with them... but it was already too late for that. Events had been set in motion that I could no longer halt, no matter how much I might wish I could.

And I did.

I wished to bring all of this to an end. I wished nothing more than to take Judas and Mary and run to a land far, far from this one, a land where no one knew us, where no one judged us, where no one expected anything of us... where we could just _be_. I wished that with all my heart, that I could shrug off this burden for someone else to take up, for my own sake... for Judas' sake, for Mary's. But I could not. There was no one else to take this burden up should I lay it down. And so we marched on, ever on.

Judas and Mary walked side by side, hand in hand, as we passed through the crowds. I alone understood my friend's abrupt about-face on the subject of Mary's presence among us, but, of course, I said nothing. They did not know that I had seen them, nor did I wish them to know. I was merely glad that now, of all times, I did not have to split my focus between the task at hand and the necessity of mediating between them... though, I will admit that I was jealous of the support they were now able to lend each other. I had never felt the weight of my position more than I did in that moment, walking several paces in front of Judas and Mary, unable to share in the comfort they gave each other by that simple contact. I forced myself to ignore that selfish desire and merely be glad of the fact that they, at least, were able to partake of each other's nearness and support.

The priest, Caiaphas, met us at the gates to the city, staring down at us from on high as we approached. That would not do. I needed to meet the high priests as an equal, as a fellow rabbi, if our movement was to have any chance at all. I could not meet them groveling at their feet like a sycophant, not even this once. I climbed the stairs opposite his position, met him height for height, met his attempts to quell the noise of the chanting crowd with an arrogant contempt that left me feeling sick for portraying it. As those self-important words left my lips, I could see Judas below me leaning against the balustrade, desperately calling my name to try to get my attention, to hush my words before I could bury myself any deeper into this grave I was busily digging. His urgency, his desperation, were like living things, beating against my chest, my back, clawing at my legs and arms, a palpable wave of fear to which I could not - to which I _would_ not - respond. I did not understand yet that his fear was not entirely for me.

When I rebuffed Caiaphas' orders, his eyes turned from mine in disgust and frustration. The irony was that I truly did sympathize with his position. It was just that I could not cave to that sympathy. I could not give him what he wanted. That was not my destiny. As Caiaphas turned away, I took that moment to meet Judas' eyes, to try to reassure him that I knew what I was about, but when our eyes met... Good G-d. When our eyes met, his were filled with an almost unreasoning terror. It was the terror of a child abandoned in a crowded marketplace, the terror of a mouse caught in the sights of a great bird of prey. He barely saw me in that moment, but he followed me up those stairs, desperate for whatever small protection I could afford him... but from what? Of what was he so afraid? He had been afraid all morning, so tense that I had been amazed he could even turn his head, but I had thought that fear all for me. This, though... this fear was different. As he crept up the stairs after me, Judas had eyes for only one man - Caiaphas. As Caiaphas descended his own stairs, Judas took several steps towards him, as though he could not help but be drawn in, and the look Caiaphas turned on him as he approached... it was disdainful. It was contemptuous. It was predatory. At that look, Judas fled back up the steps towards me and made himself as small as he possibly could. And his fear was understandable, suddenly far too understandable, as in a flash of insight, I understood that there was a history here of which I knew nothing. I had, in my ignorance, marched my nearest and dearest straight into the lion's den with no warning and no protection.

Damn all this secrecy! I still knew next to nothing about Judas' life before he joined us three years ago. He didn't speak of it, didn't allude to it. I only knew what I had gleaned from three years of watching him and what little I had overheard by listening in on conversations he had had with Mary. He was from Judea - that much I had known - but I did not know from where. I did not know the places he had traveled before coming to me. I did not know the people he had known. I had not known he had ever been to Jerusalem. I had not known that he knew Caiaphas or that Caiaphas knew him. I had not known he had a connection to the very Temple I had come here to rattle. And with the advent of this knowledge, another piece of the puzzle that was Judas fell into place then and pierced my heart. For the first time since I learned of my fate, so, so long ago... deep within my soul, far from anyone's prying eyes, at long last, far too late... I began to rebel.

* * *

Simon had once again attempted to convince me to take the waiting crowd and use it, to use their devotion, their love, for destructive purposes. He used different words, words like "freedom," "liberty," "victory," "home"... but he meant the same thing with all of them: "War." Simon wished us to overthrow the Romans, the priests, all who would oppress us. He saw the influence my words carried and sought to use them for his own purposes. The crowds knew no better. Most of my apostles knew no better. Even Mary was swept up in the moment, not recognizing the danger in Simon's words, seeing only the passion and faith in his eyes.

Judas, alone amongst the crowd, sensed the danger in Simon's words. I saw him, huddled apart, still afraid, still unsure, hand clutched around his hamsa, lips moving in silent prayer. I recognized the words on his lips immediately, of course... "Love the Lord your G-d with all your mind, with all your strength, with all your being. Set these words which I command you this day upon your heart..." Of course I knew them. And they were a powerful reminder of exactly why I could not do as Simon wished. I was not G-d. It was not given unto me to deliver our people from this self-wrought bondage.

It was good that Judas did this, reminded me in this way of the dangers of pride, the dangers in not keeping control of what my apostles were doing. In these last days I was finding it far too easy to forget. I tried to explain, to help Simon and the crowds to see that I could not do as they wished, but to no avail. They did not wish to listen, did not wish to see. In the end, I gave up, admitting defeat to myself, if to no one else. We dispelled the crowds and I sent my apostles into the city on the last missions I would ever ask of them, though they knew it not.

I sent Simon and Peter to scout the city for information. Clearly, I did not have as much of it as I truly needed. John and James I sent to secure us lodging. I sent everyone in pairs. No one was to be abroad in the city alone. Even I could feel the tension in the air, the danger awaiting us around every corner. This city was not safe for me and mine and no one knew that better than I. After all... I was to die here not more than four days hence.

Judas and Mary, of course, I took with me. I had a mission of my own to complete and I wanted no one but they to bear witness. The rebellion in my heart, the pain, the growing anger over my helplessness to truly affect any change - they tore at me, gave me no peace. What I was about to do, I already regretted, already felt remorse for, but it would not stop me from doing it. I had come here to make pilgrimage... and pilgrimage I would make.

As we approached the great Temple, Judas and Mary drew back from me, left me to lead the way, once again clutching at each other for support. I could feel Judas' tension behind me, ratcheting slowly higher with each step we took. By the time we reached the temple, he was fair vibrating with it. Mary was torn between us, sensing my anger, sensing Judas' fear, and she did not know to which one of us she should turn. I loved her for that - that she even considered it a question. It gave me hope that maybe they two would be able to comfort each other after I was gone. Bringing them together... it was perhaps the one truly good and unselfish thing I had ever done.

When we reached the steps of the Temple, however, I froze, unable to take another step. This... _this_ was what they had made of my Temple? Of G-d's most holiest of holy houses? **No**. This could not be. Arrayed in the yard and around the stairs were money lenders, gambling rings and prostitutes. _On the very steps of the Temple itself._ They were arrayed on those stairs in their scant clothing, leaving little to the imagination, dancing and writhing in suggestive postures. It was an abomination. I stepped away from Judas and Mary, slowly stalked around the yard, growing more and more furious with each step I took. _This_ was what they had made of our holy land. It was no wonder the Romans overtook us so easily. We were already corrupt, already ripe for their debauchery. I trembled with the horror of it.

Mary had left Judas' side to cleave to mine - perhaps sensing I was about to do something foolish... and because she was right, I most certainly did not wish her that close. I had no place at her side feeling as I did now. This burning anger inside of me was going to find an outlet somewhere and I feared that whoever was nearest me was going to end up hurt. It was why I had walked away from Judas. I did not want to risk turning this beast on him, because I did not know what it would do if it found a target in him. I might hurt him as I had, all unthinkingly, just the day before... or I might do worse.

I might treat him no better than one of the whores on the temple stairs. I could feel my own potential for that behavior building inside me... for I now understood why Judas had acted as he did that night that he had first met Mary, why he had come so viciously, so eagerly to my tent. This anger... in its own way it was an aphrodisiac, this need for violence. Were I another man, a different kind of man, this atmosphere, the anger it roused in me... In spite of my best intentions, I turned towards Judas, primal thoughts focusing far too easily on his face, his body. And what I saw when I looked... it made me angrier still.

Judas was distracted, staring at those on the steps, hardly noticing that I was there at all. And his eyes... there was that same fear in them as when he had looked on Caiaphas. Fear, pain... and recognition. He knew this Temple, knew these steps, perhaps even knew those gyrating upon them. He had been here before. Here was another piece to his past to which I had not been privy. And the way those on the stairs looked on _him_ was worse, still - as though he were so much meat to be eaten. Those who managed the whores of the Temple were already circling, eyes gleaming. They stayed away from Mary as she was at my side, but Judas... He stood alone. They recognized in him the same beauty I did, and that they and I should have _anything_ in common was the final straw.

Sensing them circling him, Judas had finally unfrozen from the courtyard entrance and begun to move in my direction, thinking that that was the safer place to be. Of course, with these thoughts raging in my head, he could not have been more wrong. Before he could reach me, however, one of the women placed herself in his path, cutting off his route of escape. A look passed between them, a knowing look, a look of recognition, almost of kinship, and I knew then... they had known each other before. This woman, this prostitute... she had known Judas - _my_ Judas.

She smiled, eyes warm and teasing, full of knowledge that I did not have. She bent at the waist, temptingly writhing in front of Judas, trying to draw him in to join in the debauchery. The knowing look in her eyes hinted that he had done so in the past. Not today. Today, he was not tempted. He was horrified, looked as though he might be sick right then and there... and I could not stand idly by while this particular neighbor bled, shot through the heart by someone who somehow knew him better than I.

I rushed towards them, blazing anger in my eyes. I thought I merely intended to free Judas from the paralysis this horror had settled around him. I truly thought that was my intent. Now... I am forced to consider that it may not have been altruism that drove my actions that day but jealousy. Everywhere I turned I found people to whom Judas had given away pieces of himself which he would not even let me glimpse from afar: Mary. Caiaphas. And now this woman. I had no right to think I had sole claim over him. I had no right to feel that he belonged to me. I had no right to act as though he were beholden to share his every secret with me, to think as though I had a right to be everything to him when even I knew that such pure dependency could never be healthy. I did not understand my motivation then as I do now. All I knew was that I had to free him from his paralysis, his inability to look away from this woman's temptation.

And free him I did. Better than I had hoped I would. Seeing me coming for them, Judas did unfreeze... and moved to place himself between me and the woman in question as though he somehow feared I would do her harm. And as I had done before... as I always seemed to... in that moment, I let my anger turn upon itself and strike the very one for whom I had become angered to defend. Who was this woman to him that he would think to defend her against me for whom he professed his love? How could he think I even would harm another? Had he listened to none of my teachings all this time?

Judas held out his hands beseechingly in front of him, eyes begging me to calm, to reconsider my actions. I could not. I cast him from me, so full of the righteous blaze of anger that I hardly noticed as he fell into the dust of the yard. I hardly noticed as Mary finally left my side, ran to him, helped him to rise. I hardly noticed as Judas, in turn, held Mary back from returning to my side as my rage began spiraling outward. I hardly noticed as they eventually left the courtyard, terrified by my rage in a way they had never been of any of the horrors we had seen while traveling together. I had no room in me for anything but that blinding fury. I was angry at the Romans for bringing this corruption into my holy land. I was furious with the priests for allowing us to become ripe for that Roman deflowering. Most of all... most of all, I was angry with G-d. I was furious with G-d. How could he let this happen? How could he imbue me with the desire to fix it and then strip me from the people before I had barely begun to accomplish that end?

And so I raged. I blindly destroyed. I spent my fury on the fire pits, the bottles of wine, the trays of money and gambling chits. And when I finished my destruction, when I had chased them all from the Temple - at least for that night - I fell into despair.

I wandered the streets, hopeless, dark and dismal thoughts crowding my mind. My work was not finished. I had accomplished but the smallest portion of what G-d had surely meant for me to do. I did not understand how my death would serve that purpose when my life had not. I did not understand.

The sky grew dim around me, the streets dark and twisted. This place was not safe. I knew it. I could feel it. And when the second stooped figure in ragged cloth stumbled across my path, I knew with certainty where my steps had led me... the leper colony. I could not even summon the will to be afraid. If I already knew the time and place I was to die, why should it matter? What difference would it make if I were to contract leprosy beforehand?

The things they wanted were both simpler and more complex than what the crowds had wanted. They wanted my touch, my grace. They wished to be healed of their hurts, to spend their lives in less misery... to be noticed, to be shown a modicum of care. I did what I could, doled out my compassion and my empathy to them as though I had them in boundless supply to be shared and still they took more. They took and they took and they took. One became two, who became four, who became eight... sixteen... thirty-two... and more. There were so many I could not count them all. They pressed in, begging for a release from the pain, for me to heal what could not be healed, for me to be the Messiah they had so longed for to deliver them from the evils of this world... and I could not be. I could not be for them what they wished. I could not save them. I could not even save myself.

The crowd pressed in, clawing at me, pushing me, shoving me, shaking me when I failed to give them what they wanted. I hoped then... I hoped for a terrible thing. I hoped to die. I hoped that their skeletal, claw-like and bleeding hands would rip me to shreds and leave of me nothing for the priests or the Romans to use to make an example. I wished that they would overturn G-d's plan for me and end my own suffering.

That prayer, of course, went unanswered, and my salvation came in a most unlikely form. When my last attempt to win free of the mob failed and I screamed out my desperate pleas for them to leave me be, for them to fix their own sordid lives for I could not... there was Judas. My love. My hope. My salvation. He fought his way through the crowd to my side like an avenging angel, sent the lepers and the beggars away with one furiously protective look.

I almost could not meet his eyes, not after what I had done, but to my surprise when I did... there was no condemnation there. There was only pain. Be it pain for me or for himself, though, I could not have said. When I attempted to speak, to explain to him my fear, my anger, my own pain... he simply shook his head, shushed me. He settled his outer robe over me and pulled me back to rest against his chest, the smell of him in the fabric and the feel of his arms around me doing more to warm me than the course linen alone ever could have. He eased me to the ground, leaned over me to press a gentle kiss against my forehead. I moved to pull him down with me, to keep him at my side as I had the previous night, needing him close... but he pulled away. He pulled away, his eyes so desolate that it made me wish to weep. I reached for him but no words or action on my part had ever been able to sway Judas once his mind was set. It was no different now. He left my side, took up a post nearby to watch over me as I slept... and ceded his place at my side to Mary.

I knew then that the moment I had feared had come. After my earlier display, I had well and truly lost him. I had finally pushed Judas away from me one time too many. This time... this time he would not return. My earlier fears had been prophetic. And with Judas' withdrawal, I knew one more thing - one more thing that I desperately wished I could unknow.

I had always known this - that it would be one of my own apostles who would be the one who delivered me into the hands of the priests and ultimately the Romans. I had known this since I was small. And Judas - my own, my beloved Judas - my nearest and dearest... I now knew that _he_ would be the one to do it and, worse, that my own careless actions had been what would drive him to such desperate action. Heart heavy with that knowledge, I turned my face into Mary's chest... and wept.

* * *

I do not know what I expected that morning. What I do know is that waking up with Mary draped over me and Judas' presence scarce but for the lingering scent of him in the fabric of his robe was as great a disappointment as any I had ever had. I did not know to where he had fled that night, nor did I know where he was that morning, but I do know that Mary tried to hide what little of his presence remained when the other apostles finally joined us. She gathered up his robe to her breast and inhaled deeply of his scent before hiding it away from Simon's narrowed, prying eyes. He did not entirely approve of my association with Mary. I do not believe he knew of my relations with Judas, at all... though if he did not it was because he chose not to know. Judas was discreet, to be certain, but tent walls are thin and when he did not share tent space with me, Judas bunked with Peter and Simon.

Peter, at least, had come around to a more friendly attitude towards Mary. I often caught them, heads bent together in conversation, smiles on their faces. Peter had taken my teachings most to heart of all my apostles and fought to view Mary on her own merits, tried to see in her what I saw. It gave me pleasure to see him succeed, even as it worried me that such understanding was causing a rift in my apostles greater than the one that had initially been between Mary and Judas. Judas... Surely Simon and Peter had noticed his periodic absences at night. Perhaps that was why Peter was so kindly disposed towards Mary. Perhaps he hoped that with her presence, tainted and used though it might be, I might settle down with her, cease this forbidden relationship he, too, surely knew I must have with Judas.

I fought not to dwell on it. Regardless of whether Simon had known or not, regardless of whether Peter had known or not... there was no longer anything to know. I knew that with as much certainty as I knew the time and place of my own death. Judas would never again come to my tent at night. Judas would never again be mine to claim, nor I his. That was over as surely as if I had buried it myself and I mourned its loss as deeply as though I had. I wanted nothing more than to have Judas by my side in that moment. I wanted to run after him, find him out wherever he had gone the night before and spill the entire truth to him. I needed him to understand. I needed him to know that none of this was his fault, that he had a great part to play in this drama and it was one I would never have wished on he who was my most dear, that I would save him all this suffering if I could. The truth, though, was even simpler than that. I just... needed him. And I would never have him, again.

I forced my mind from those thoughts, forced myself to focus on the gathering crowd, on my apostles, on the growing camaraderie between Mary and Peter and how the advent of that alliance made Simon scowl all the more. There was trouble brewing there, between Simon and Peter, Simon and Mary. I would have to trust in them to sort it out themselves. I could spare no more attention for the petty squabbles that took place in our camp. I was out of time.

I did not see Judas all of that day. My apostles kept me busy, introducing me around the city, trying to sway me yet again to their own plans. I would have none of it, could not engage even in this small way. Finally, they gave up, left me to wander the city as I would with only Mary at my side. We spoke little, did less still than that. I do not think it such a far reach to think that we both dwelled upon Judas' absence that day. The difference was that Mary worried over what he might be doing... and I did not. I knew very well what he was doing, what he _must_ be doing to fulfill prophecy. And so, I steered us clear of the Temple. Judas was there, even now, handing me over to the priests in word, if not in deed... and that was difficult enough. I did not want to compound the situation by risking us catching him out before it was time. And, still I wished with all my heart that I could take this burden from him. Perhaps I stayed away for that reason, as well. If I strayed too close, I would be tempted to turn my own self in just to spare Judas the pain of having to do it... and that was not what I had foreseen.

We returned to camp outside the city walls that night. After my display in the town square the day prior and my fit of anger at the temple, it was not safe for us to stay inside the city. Judas returned late, refused Peter's offer of food, refused Simon's query for news. He refused hospitality from all among the apostles, eyes haunted, mouth tight with pain, posture hunched as though to ward off a blow. My heart ached for him.

I went to him, unable to help myself, reached out a hand to touch the dark curls of that bowed head. Judas jerked his gaze upwards at my touch, stared at me out of those frightened, haunted eyes and it was all I could do not to take him in my arms right then, to try to explain that I understood he was only doing as he must. I realized then, the danger in that impulse. Judas would not understand that this had to happen. His loyalty was to the movement, yes, but his love was for me. As vilely as I had accused him of not putting me first in his affections, I had known even as I did so that it was a false accusation. For Judas, I always came first... it was just that he understood that I placed my ideals above my self and fought to allow me the luxury of doing so. As well as I knew that, though, I also knew that such devotion to my cause would not extend to helping me martyr myself. I knew that. And so, I could not explain, could not take the risk that he would somehow talk me out of my decision.

I let my hand drop, looked away. Judas watched me for a moment more before once again dropping his own gaze, focusing back on the fire. I walked away. As I left his side, though, I passed Mary walking in the opposite direction. She had a determined look on her face as she walked, but she spared a scornful one for me as she passed. She loved me. I knew that. But she did not approve of how I had been treating Judas of late, for, really... she loved him, too. That knowledge - that she loved us both equally - made me want things, things I knew I could not have.

I wanted a life with Judas and Mary at my side - a simple life. A life I could spend building with my hands - chairs, tables, homes. A life I could spend raising mine and Mary's children... perhaps Judas and Mary's children, as well. A life I could spend loving them both, pleasing them both, caring for them both. A life I could spend in a small town, teaching the local children to grow into adults who cared, who loved, who would spread light in the world. I would spend endless hours sitting in the gardens, in the alehouses, teaching my lessons to any who would listen, giving away my love, my knowledge, to any who wanted it.

Mary would care for me, bringing me pitchers of water to quench my thirst as I yet again talked myself hoarse in the square. She would bring me baskets of bread and cheese to share with the children who clambered over me, eager to hear my stories, to bask in my light. And at the end of the day, no matter where I was... Judas would come for me, a fond, exasperated smile on his face as he saw I had once again whittled the day away with my teaching, forgetting my latest project on the workbench. He would sit and he would listen, the same fond, attentive expression on his face as I taught any who would listen along with him... though he would know my words, as always, were really for him. As the day grew long and began to darken around us, he would come closer, drop a gentle hand onto my shoulder and grip it lightly, tell me it was time to go. He would reassure the children that he would allow me back tomorrow if I accomplished my work first. Then, when all the children were gone, he would bend over me, press his lips to mine to hide his amused smile.

That one gentle kiss would turn into two, into ten, into twenty, as he let his continued hunger for me take rein for just a moment. Then he would draw me away - away from the gardens, away from the tavern, away from the courtyard or the dusty street corner. He would tempt me with teasing smiles and touches, fanning my own hunger into a blaze until by the time we reached our home - a small, modest tent or shack on a small piece of land that perhaps we did not even own - we would be so hungry for each other that any thought of eating the meal Mary had prepared would be forgotten and we would instead turn to enticing her into forgetting it, as well.

I wanted that life. I wanted it so badly I fair ached with it. And I could have it. I knew I could. If I would just forget this duty, this hated responsibility, it could be mine. If I hinted, for even a moment, that I wanted those things, Judas would find a way to ensure I had them - somewhere safe, far from this corrupt and desolate land. _That_ was why I could do no such thing. This dream, this desire for that simpler life, had to remain my secret alone or I would never have the courage to do what must be done... or to allow Judas to do what he must do.

I doubled back on myself moments later, unable to resist watching my two most precious on this, possibly my last night to do so. They spoke in hushed tones, heads bent together as they spoke. Judas' shoulders shook and I could not see from here if he wept... but in my heart, I knew he did. He wept for me, for himself, for the dreams he could feel dying around us in this dark city. Eventually he calmed, allowed Mary to draw him into her arms and stroke his hair, his back. I wondered for a moment if I might catch them out, again, as I had the other night, but it was clear after a moment that such activities were the furthest thing possible from their minds. They began to speak again, voices still low to avoid being overheard. In answer, I simply crept closer.

The conversation had turned to talk of me. Judas leaned against Mary, his dark eyes intent and a little afraid. He said, "When they say he is the son of G-d... moreover, when they say he is G-d, himself... Mary... do you believe them?"

Mary's eyes widened, her face became troubled and she looked away. I wished to go to them, to tell them that this should not even be a matter of debate between them, that they, as my closest companions should know the untruth of those words... but I did not. I could not interfere, because, in a way, I needed to know her answer as badly as Judas did and I hated myself for it.

Mary took Judas' hand in hers, her eyes softening, "Judas... my friend, my brother... you know as well as I that Jesus is no more than a man. He is a good man. He is a kind man. He is an exceptional man... but he is still just a man." Though my heart melted in relief at those words, at this sign that the situation had not spun that far beyond my control, it began to pound with fear again at her next words.

Mary placed a soft kiss into Judas' palm, then pressed his hand to her cheek, "But Judas, the things he does, the things he knows, the things his words can possess others to do..." Her voice turned hard for a moment, bitter, "I am a prostitute, a woman of ill-repute, yet he took me into his fold and gave me acceptance, gave me a better life, one of which I can be proud. He gave me back the ability to hold my head high in a crowd - he gave me back my soul. Is that not miraculous enough? Does he have to walk on water to be the son of G-d? So, sometimes... I wonder, my friend. I do wonder."

Judas slumped over, his curls falling forward to hide his expression from me, but his voice was rough with enough emotion when he spoke that I could clearly picture the look that would be on his face. He said, "Then I envy you those moments of wonder, Mary... my friend, my sister. I don't wonder. As you say, I know very well that Jesus is no more than a man... a good man, an idealistic man... a troubled man, but still, just a man. And as a man... I fear for him." Judas turned to face Mary, then, pulled his hand from her cheek to take both of her hands in his, "He believes in the essential goodness of mankind, believes that when they are told truth, told a better way, that they will lay down their swords and truly beat them into plowshares. He believes that they follow him because of the words he says, when truly they follow him for the belief that doing so will earn them a place in Heaven."

Judas rose to his feet, began to furiously pace back and forth, his hands buried in his hair and tugging at the curls. He said, "They no longer care about the words, Mary. They only care about pleasing him." He let out a bitter laugh, "The Messenger has become more important than his message... and I can't get him to see that!"

_Ah, Judas... in that, you are wrong. I __**do**__ see it. I see it and it causes me more pain than you can ever know._ But it gave me hope that at least these, my closest, truest disciples, saw me for what I really was. It would make no difference in the end, but still... this one small truth brought me joy. The great wheels of fate were already set in motion here. I had laid the groundwork and my apostles would take up the work and continue it long after I was gone, would use these half-truths, use the wonder and the hope of people like Mary to bring all others to understand the importance of the message long after the Messenger had been taken from them... or so I hoped. It was the only positive thing I could imagine coming from this debacle, this warping of the simple truth of my teachings of love and acceptance.

Mary was soothing him, then, taming the force of Judas' anger, his fear, his despair. I would that it were me in her place, but it could not be. And there was some fundamental connection, some understanding between they two to which I was not privy and Judas now denied me the right of that closeness which we once both cherished. Mary had come between us in a way I did not foresee. I told myself that it was better this way, that they would have each other when I was gone... but that was cold comfort to me when I lay shivering and alone that night, pining after the warmth and connection I once had so close at hand.

Judas could not know this, though. I could not even let a hint of it reach him, for if it did, if he knew how much I missed him, still desired him... I knew he would come to me in a heartbeat. And that would have done neither of us any good service, especially not then. So I stayed silent and I watched and I envied Mary the right to take him in her arms as he wept out his fear and his pain... and then I took myself off to my cold, empty bedroll and cursed the inescapable truth of my existence and the loneliness which accompanied it like a bosom companion.

* * *

The next day dawned quiet, cold and with a sense of gloom in the air that hung over us like a shroud... my shroud. This day marked my last day of freedom upon this Earth, though none but I and Judas knew that it was so. He kept his distance from me in camp, always close enough to see me, but not always close enough to be seen. He was wild-shy around me like he had not been in months - years, almost - but it was his eyes that disturbed me most. Those eyes... anguished and sickened, they begged my forgiveness every time they met mine. I tried my best to give it as I could, to tell my dearest friend with my own eyes that he was forgiven for what he must do... but I still do not think he understood.

We went into the city that day, silent and solemn, to gather the supplies we would need for seder later that night. To my surprise, Judas chose to accompany Mary and myself, though he spoke little, choosing to act merely as a pair of hands and a strong back to carry what we purchased, turning himself into a mere beast of burden. I saw Mary at his side more than once that day, urging him to speak of what clearly troubled him, but he would not. His eyes, however, spoke more eloquently of it to me than words ever could.

Mary left us at one point, finding it easier to move about in the crowd without my far too recognizable face at her side. She slipped away into the marketplace, leaving Judas and I standing in the shadows. I opened my mouth, thought to attempt conversation, at least, but the pained look in Judas' eyes stopped me before I could speak even a single syllable. He stepped up behind me until there was no space left between our bodies and pressed his face to my shoulder, into the crook of my neck. We stayed there like that for several minutes, silent, both in pain, both unable to speak of what pained us. Had Mary not returned, I think I might have done anything in that instant to take this burden from him... from us. I would have told him all. I would have taken his hand and fled the city. I would have built that shed in some far off, ramshackle town. I would have resigned myself to a life of happy obscurity with none but he and Mary at my side. I would have thrown away my entire sacred mission just to enable him to lift his head once more.

But Mary did return. She returned to my side and Judas took the last of the supplies from her and pulled away, turning himself into a mere beast of burden once more. He would not meet my eyes again after that, stayed with us only long enough to deliver the supplies back to camp, then left, departed for G-d-only-knew-where... and my heart mourned his absence, mourned the precious hours, of which I had so few, that I would not spend in his presence. We did not see him again until that night at seder.

When Mary and I arrived, he was lurking around the edge of the table, barely close enough to be termed included, barely close enough for words to reach him. He moved as a man broken, beaten down. Mary sat down at my right and I took from her the unleavened bread, opened my mouth to say the prayers... and could not, not with Judas' broken eyes upon me from so far distant. It occurred to me then, that the only two people who would truly mourn my passing - would mourn the loss of the man I was, not the martyr I would become - were a whore... and a traitor. The others, my chosen, they would move on to the next Messiah, the next figurehead for their movement now that this one had run his course. And my two most loyal friends, my two best beloved... their names would be thrown into the mud for any to trample upon. Thinking that, dwelling upon it, I began to feel something that in all my time of foreknowledge of these events I had not felt. Deep in my heart... I began to rage.

I clenched the matzo in my hand so tightly it shattered into pieces. I could feel it as Judas drew nearer, pulled in by my flash of rage as he was by so little else, as though he could not help himself. I could hear it as Mary rocked back onto the balls of her feet, ready to rise to my aid should I require it. I did not. For this, I could speak for myself. I flung my words out across the table like poisoned barbs, hoping above all that this time they would find the appropriate targets and fearing above all that they would instead find the target they always seemed to - Judas. I said, "I would go easier unto the end were I not being delivered up to it by the hands of my own." Those at the table before me immediately leaned forwards, began babbling their assurances, their denials of my words. I held up a hand for silence, hardly daring to look up, to meet Judas' eyes for fear that he would take that contact as confirmation that my words were meant for him when that could not have been farther from the truth.

What Judas had done, he had done in love and in innocence. He truly did not believe that those in the Temple would do me harm, truly believed that there might be some peaceful solution that allowed us all to live. He was brilliant, my Judas... but he was naïve. The others at my table, the rest of my chosen, on the other hand... they had molded and manipulated me into the very martyr's end I had so fought to avoid for the first thirty years of my life and they had done it full well knowing to what end they brought me.

"I must have been mad, indeed, to believe that any of you would remember me even one hour past my demise!" I threw the matzo down onto the table, watched as Mary gingerly gathered it up and began passing it out. Instead, I picked up the goblet of wine, began pouring. And as Mary took the first sip, I spat out, "This wine... for all you care, you could be drinking my blood, such is the depth of your feeling for me. This bread may as well be my own flesh for all the difference it makes to you!" I picked up another of the matzo and broke it, ignored Judas' flinch at the loud crack it made as it broke, his aborted move to lift his hand and stay my actions. I said, "Remember this. Each time you raise food and drink to your lips, each time you recline in freedom at this table, remember whose blood, whose flesh and bone, bought you the freedom to do so." I turned bitterly from the table, said, "But that is a foolish wish indeed, for you to remember me so long after I am gone. One of you will deny me, not more than hours hence, disavow himself of any association with me. This is how much my teachings, my sacrifices, my long toil and pain have meant to my chosen. These are the rewards with which you shower me - denial and betrayal!"

Judas had come forward by then, an almost desperate hope in his eyes. We passed each other as I turned back to the table, our gazes meeting at last, and in his I saw such despair that it was its own kind of madness. He _wanted_ me to reveal him, needed his sin publicly acknowledged, as though he wished to be punished and humiliated for the crime he had committed against me. This, though, I would deny him for as long as I could - not out of anger, but out of love. I turned instead to Peter, explained as gently as I could my foreknowledge of his public outcry of denial. I could not see why it would happen, but I could guess clearly enough. Once I was arrested, it would not be safe to be known to have stood at my side. I would not want my chosen to follow me into death and if such a denial would keep Peter alive to spread the word, to support Mary and Judas after I was gone... it was a price I would willingly pay. But I am human. I kept that understanding to myself, perhaps out of spite, perhaps out of envy, perhaps out of my newfound rage at my circumstances, who can know? Not I. I am not G-d.

As Peter wept at my feet, Simon half-rose to his and shouted back at me, "And what is this betrayal of which you speak, my Lord? None of us here has breathed even a word against you. We have done nothing but support you from the start. From whence come these wild and baseless accusations?"

I did not wish to say, did not wish to explain any further my meaning, but Judas... he beat me to it. Rising from the table, he shouted over even Simon's formidable bellow, "Cut out the dramatics! Surely your famed foreknowledge has not chosen now to fail. You know very well who will betray you!" I met his gaze for the second time that night, my own begging him to stand down, to let me spare him this pain, at least, but he persevered, pressed on, his tone changing to that of a plea as he came around the table, "At least allow me to explain why-"

No. No, that I could not allow. I could not allow that explanation, could not take the risk of it persuading me to alter my course. In my desperation, I lashed back, my words, as always, harsher than intended, "I don't **care** why you do it! Just go!"

Our gazes met over the heads of the others and Judas, as always, saw things in mine that I did not intend, would not have wished him to see. He breathed out, "You _want_ me to do this... Jesus... you..." He looked around the table then, at the shining faces of our companions, the rapture as the zealots realized what my arrest would mean for their movement - a dead martyr is of more value to a warrior zealot than a live purveyor of peace on any day. As it dawned on him what I meant to do, that my arrest would be no escape, but would instead mean my certain death, I saw fear flood his body like the raging cold waters of the Nile. Judas reached for me, grabbed my arms and pulled me towards him, hissed out, "**No.** I will not do this. I will not allow you to make me the instrument of your destruction."

I shook my head, closed my eyes against the desperation in his, "It is already done, you fool. This has been predestined all along. They are waiting for you."

He gripped me tighter, shook me so hard it rattled my teeth. The very bones in my head seemed to reverberate with the movement. Judas said, "No. Jesus... I admire you, I love you, and I would do almost anything you ask of me... but I will not do this. I will dog your steps and ruin your every move for the cause if I must, but I will not sacrifice you on the alter of ambition - yours or theirs. You can not ask that of me!" He dropped his face to my chest then and I felt the warm dampness of his tears as he shed them against my tunic, "Please... Jesus, I beg you... do not ask this of me..."

It was selfish of me, I know, but I could not let it end this way, with Judas all but on his knees begging. I could not let my last view of him be of one broken and beaten, wailing and bemoaning his part in my fate. I needed him strong. I needed him full of fire, of anger. I needed him to be Judas Iscariot... _my_ Judas Iscariot. I needed to carry that memory of him with me like a talisman, to know that he had passion enough to survive, to carry on my work without me. I allowed myself one brief moment, one last embrace. And even as I pulled him close, even as my body relished the feel of his against it, I spoke my poisoned words into his ear, "Save me your speeches. Save me your explanations and your honeyed words. I don't want to know. I don't _care_ to know."

Judas jerked in my embrace, finally pulled away from me, eyes wild, breathing ragged, as my words hit home. He spat out my given title like the curse I had come to regard it as, "_Christ._ You deserve this. You deserve all of this." He lunged forwards then, as though to swing at me or perhaps to grab me in another embrace, but I will never know what he intended with that movement. Thomas and James leapt to their feet and restrained him before he could connect with it. He slumped in their hold, then, defeat written in every line of his body. His next words were so quiet that I had to lean forwards to hear them.

"To think... I once thought you were different. I thought..." Judas let out a bitter laugh, though there was nothing at all humorous in this situation, "I admired you. Jesus..." He raised his head then, eyes bleak with anger and despair, "Well, now that I know you have it in you to ask this of me... to use me for your own purposes without a care for my own will, my own desires - to use me like the whore I once was - now I despise you."

And, now, finally the truth - the truth I'd long suspected, but had not dared ask after. The truth of Judas' past, that he had shared with Mary, but never with me. And I could do nothing, say nothing, to ease the pain of my betrayal of him... nor his of me. I didn't dare. It would ruin everything and we'd gone too far down this road to turn back, now.

I raised my hands to cup Judas' cheeks, allowed myself the now-forbidden luxury of stroking them with my thumbs and said, "You liar... you Judas." He did not despise me. He could not despise me. I almost wished that he had it in him to do so. The truth was, he loved me still, as I did him, and so he would turn that hatred on himself, instead... and that was the bitterest tragedy of them all. I drew him out of the arms of my apostles, cradled him close to me for one last precious time - the instant yielding in his body to that embrace giving lie to his words of mere seconds before. I even went so far as to twine our fingers together before roughly forcing him from our company at last as I screamed, "Go!"

As he fled, a flurry of yellow to my right warned me just in time to catch Mary as she raced after Judas, arms outstretched. No. It was not yet time for that. This needed to be done. After... after it was over, she could go to him. I wanted her to go to him, to give him what comfort she could, to help him pick up what pieces there might be left to reassemble... but not now. Now, I still had need of her at my side... and I needed her not to interfere with Judas' now sacred task. She was stiff in my arms, refused to return my embrace as I clutched her to me, buried my face in her neck. She even went so far as to keep her arms raised away from my body, as though the very thought of touching me repulsed her... and my heart ached with it, desperate for one last embrace to show that I had not lost them both.

I was not to have it. Mary continued to hold her arms stiffly away from me, allowed me to embrace her while refusing to return that affection. She was angry, furious, and she would not forgive me easily for what I had just done. Perhaps she would understand in time, but not now. I let her go, then, let her run after Judas now that there was no chance of her catching him up. As she fled, I allowed myself to be led off by my apostles - and even in their company, I was more truly alone than I had ever been.

This was the beginning.

This was the end.

This was all there would ever be for me, forevermore.

* * *

I railed at G-d that night. I screamed and spat, begged and pleaded, howled out the grief and rage of a life unfulfilled, of a child abandoned, a lamb led to the slaughter. And still, I couldn't purge the pain. Worse, there was no answer. Worse still, I came to realize that I had not expected one. I could no longer hear G-d. His voice was silent to me, his wishes unexpressed. I was a child throwing a tantrum, refusing to act as bidden... and He perhaps had no patience for that. Or perhaps He realized, as I did, that it didn't matter, that the wheels were in motion and no matter how I raged, I would not escape this fate, so why waste His time convincing me it was so? Who is to say?

I knew that Judas would arrive soon, that he would come with a cadre of guards at his back, to take me away, to condemn me to my fate. Peter, John and James were asleep around me, ignorant of what was soon to befall us, even with my warning so recently rung in their ears. I had no reason to expect that tonight would bring anything but pain... that that pain would be all I would know for what remained of my life. I had no reason to expect anything different, but still... still I hoped.

He came to me on silent feet, his eyes hollow pits of despair, his body leaden with it. I didn't ask questions then, sensed that if I spoke, if I tried to bring the present into this moment, it would be lost, gone as though it had never been. Judas' lips, also, spoke no words. Still, we communicated. We had loved each other too long and too well not to understand what the other couldn't say. He had heard every word of my argument with my Father in Heaven, of that I'd no doubt. He knew, now, that I despised this end to which I'd brought us as much as he, was just as trapped in it and just as unable to see a way out. He did not speak of it. He did not even hint to me that he knew... but I could read him as well as he did me. I could hear the anguish in his hearbeat against mine, feel the anger in his hands on my body, taste the grief in his kiss. We were doomed, Judas and I. We always had been.

I did not know if the guards watched, if they were privy to all that happened between us. I didn't care. All I cared for was the feel of Judas in my arms, once more. In an echo of that very first time we had lain together, Judas lowered me to the ground, covered my body with his own. As he settled over me, as I realized his intent, to have from me what he had not since that first time, as I realized that he was no longer willing to yield to me in any way, even this, my heart leapt, rejoiced. It gave me hope - hope that Judas had found the strength he would need to survive me, to make his way on his own, hope that he might find happiness, might become his own man, capable of so much more than riding at my coattails.

I didn't understand then, that this meant none of those things. This was merely Judas finally granting me my own final wish - that we live as equals... that we part as equals. This was Judas saying goodbye.

We didn't have long, didn't even dare undress completely. We both knew we were stealing this time, attempting to make off with it like bandits in the night, yet knowing that we would never get past the gates of morning with our stolen treasure. Our coupling was fast, furtive, barely enough to satisfy even on a purely carnal level, much less the spiritual one we craved from each other. It wasn't enough, would never be enough. and still, we couldn't stop ourselves from reaching for more, from trying to hold on.

In the end, I lay wrapped around him, my arms holding him tightly to me, pulling his face down to merge his lips with my own. My body clenched tightly around him, ringing cries of pleasure and pain both from his lips, even as I devoured those cries with my mouth, desperate to keep as much of him to myself as I could, for as long as I could.

When we parted, as eventually we had to, Judas would not meet my gaze, refused to look up, to let me see what was in his eyes. But, then... I did not need to see. I knew. Judas' hands, his lips, his entire body, had screamed the truth to me as we lay entwined. He knew that I would not survive this morning... and now I knew that neither would he.

And so we come to it - the end of our sordid tale. I saw him again that morning, more than once - saw Mary, as well. In her extremity, she forgave me, and for that I am grateful. She pleaded with me to stop this, to give the Romans what they wanted so that I could live - she too sensed the darkness that had settled upon Judas and knew that she had no hope of redeeming him without me at her side, knew that if she could not convince me to live that she would lose us both. But it was not to be.

Judas shrank further and further into his own shadow, into mine, and in the end... I knew that I had truly lost everything. Judas took his own life that morning, unable to bear witness to what I had used him to do, unwilling to shoulder the last of that burden, perhaps determined to make me pick up my fair share of it - and I would. It was the least I could do.

At the end, when the Roman came to me, tried to convince me one last time to allow him to save my life, I could give him no answer but the grief and despair in my eyes - a grief and despair so absolute that they had become their own kind of madness. He could not save me. I could not even save myself. I _would_ not save myself, not now that doing so would not save the one I loved, as well. That would have been a betrayal I could never live with. And so my fate is sealed. I am to die upon a Roman cross, follow my own, my Judas, into death. And that was fitting. More so than I can say. I am coming, Judas... wait for me.

* * *

The pain of the cross is almost welcome, the decay of my body in the burning hot desert sun a welcome relief from the pain in my heart. Mary stays by me, hour by hour, waiting for my body to finally give out, her tears the only sound I can hear over the roaring of my own failing heart.

I dream. I dream of that forbidden future, the one I had so desperately craved. I dream of Judas at my side, and Mary, of her belly swollen with our seed, of the family we would raise between us. I dream of futures more distant still, a glimpse of what may come as a reward for the pain of this life - a better life, one in which humanity's every need is granted as easily as it is wished for. I dream of a life of music, bright lights and dancing, of my Judas, sparkling bright as the sun and full of fire - all his promise realized. I dream of Mary, the heat of her passion, the gentle strength of her touch, her soaring laugh, free to be who she will, free of anyone's judgment but her own.

I dream and Judas and Mary are beside me, living that dream, living the life we should have had, the one I would have wanted for us... our every wish fulfilled.

I dream... and hope fervently never to wake.

* * *

**_A/N:_** And so we come to it. For those of you who wished a happy ending for them, I hope this was happy enough, or at least gave you enough closure to be satisfying. Thank you for sticking with me through the wait for RL to settle down. To have had any readers at all for this story was more than I even hoped for, so I thank you for that, too. ^_^ It's been a pleasure!


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